the profundity of what was coming next—“is the end of the world.” In fact, Lance went on, his knuckles drumming on the table, did Teddy know why he was really in Boston? (No, how could he?) Well, Vance was visiting a girl. They’d only lately been introduced, so it was too soon to know if it was serious, but jeez, you know what, Teddy? Stranger things happened all the time. When he offered congratulations, Lance said, “Thanks, pal. Really, that…means a lot.”
Was it the pal that made the penny drop? Whatever the reason, Teddy was suddenly sure that Vance, with all this phony camaraderie, was setting a trap. Had, in fact, already set it.
“But, you know what, Teddy? There’s one other thing you could do for me that would mean even more.”
“What’s that, Lance?”
“Vance,” he said, his friendly façade falling completely away.
“Right.” Well, now he knew.
“You could tell me what really happened on that island over Memorial Day. The four of you all alone in that house. Three guys. One girl. Make me understand.”
“Nothing happened,” Teddy told him, a lie that put Jacy in his arms all over again, their bodies rising and lowering, weightless in the swell. “We were all just good friends.”
“That’s what I want you to make me understand. How that works. Because I have some questions.”
He wasn’t kidding, either, and once they started, the questions came fast and furious. He barely gave him the opportunity to answer one before asking the next, as if Teddy were hooked up to a lie detector and the answers to the initial questions—name, address, age, occupation—were already known to the questioner, worthwhile only to establish a baseline for what followed. Had Jacy said anything about not wanting to go through with the wedding? Anything about Vance himself that would indicate why she would want to break off their engagement? Was she nursing a grievance of some sort? Did she seem unhappy? Was she worried about anything? Was she acting strangely? Because otherwise—you know what, Teddy? It didn’t really add up, did it? In fact, the whole thing was troubling. Deeply troubling.
And did Teddy know what troubled Vance most of all? It was this whole just-good-friends deal: was he actually supposed to believe that? Because if they were just good friends, why had Jacy been so secretive about where she was going that weekend? Okay, sure, he could understand her not leveling with her parents, who definitely would fucking not have approved. But why not tell him, her fiancé, unless of course she was feeling guilty about something? What did Teddy think? Did Jacy have some reason to feel guilty? What were the sleeping arrangements like that weekend? Did Jacy have her own room, or was it like one big pajama party? Did they wear pajamas, Teddy? Had they smoked a lot of marijuana? (That was the actual word he’d used, not pot or weed or even grass.) How much did they drink, these three guys and one girl? Did they get her drunk? Who tucked her in at night? “Explain these things to me, Teddy. Explain what good friends means to somebody like you.”
Teddy chose his words carefully, partly because precision was called for, but also because with each new loaded, sarcastic question it became evident that the young man sitting across the booth from him was seething with rage. “Well, it’s true we were good friends,” Teddy said, “but as you know, Vance, it’s impossible to be around Jacy without being in love with her, at least a little.”
“You, too, Teddy? Were you in love with her?”
“I guess.”
“You guess,” he said, sneering now. “Did you fuck her? That’s a question you should be able to answer without guesswork.”
“No,” Teddy told him, wondering if he actually had been connected to a lie detector right then what the needle would be doing. “I did not.”
“How about your two pals? Did they get any luckier?”
“She had her own room. Us guys took turns sleeping on the couch.”
“Did the doors have locks?”
“They didn’t need to. Look, Lincoln’s in love with someone else, a girl named Anita. They’re practically engaged. The two of them headed to Arizona later that same week.”
“And the big guy? What’s his name again?”
“Mickey.”
“Bingo. He’s the one she liked the best, right?”
Teddy felt a powerful urge to deny this, but held his tongue. “Nothing happened between them, okay?”
“Yeah, but how would you know that?”
Because, Teddy thought, Mickey wouldn’t have been able to contain his joy. “Because we’re friends.”